Conservation issues and assumptions for the protection of objects of the former KL Auschwitz-Birkenau

Jolanta Banaś-Maciaszczyk

Auschitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum (Poland)

Rafał Pióro

Auschitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum (Poland)
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1797-7307

Abstract

The article presents a scale and challenges of the protection and preservation of the former German Nazi Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camp.
The sequence of actions taken in order to preserve the site from the moment of the museum foundation in 1947, through establishing the professional conservation laboratories in 2003, to the first works carried out within the extensive long-term conservation program (Master Plan for Preservation) in the period 2012–2016, has been described in the synthetic and cross-sectional manner.
The authors point to main directions and principles, the rules that were applied by the following generations responsible for preservation of the former camp. They specify also the current conservation guidelines formed on the basis of the experience from the works performed in the period 1947–2002, that were later revised and specified by the team of certified conservators employed by the museum.
The article indicates the most significant events related to the protection and preservation of the former camp and mentions some selected conservation projects that were carried out on the basis of the present conservation guidelines.
Auschwitz is an example which shows that thanks to the early steps taken and later consistently implemented, the authenticity of this place has been successfully maintained. Those actions enabled also to develop mechanisms for long-term planned conservation.

Keywords:

the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, preservation of the former Auschwitz-Birkenau camp, conservation issues concerning the Auschwitz-Birkenau objects and structures